Tag Archives: teaching tool

eStream 2025 update: What’s new?

Pedagogy, , ,

An update to Planet eStream will be launched across Lancaster University on 23rd April 2025. It is quite a big change and users will be automatically moved to the new version on this date.

If you aren’t already familiar with the platform, Planet eStream is the recommended method of embedding on-demand videos into Moodle courses. You can also use it for multimedia student submissions without file type or size limits. Another feature is Planet eStream Connect which makes it easy to record upcoming TV and radio programmes, with access to an extensive archive of pre-recorded shows that can also be embedded directly into Moodle. The TV and radio archive currently goes back to 2007 and eStream are aiming to backfill the archive to 1987.

This new update doesn’t just provide a new look; there are great improvements to a user’s experience through a more streamlined navigation and recording is now available across all browsers without the need for additional plugins.

In this post, I’m going to introduce you to some of the key changes and a couple of features you may not have noticed.

The new look

Your area in eStream is now a side bar that can be opened and closed and appears on the right hand side of the screen. It automatically pops up when you enter the site and can be closed via the ‘X’ sign. To reopen the sidebar click on your profile/initials icon in the top right hand corner. The default section of your area is the “favourites” tab but you can also access other tabs relevant to you such as your watch history, your media area, quizzes, video edits and conversions. You might remember that your personal eStream area used to default to the quizzes tab so the default to the favourites tab is a small change.

The Lancaster University eStream homepage also looks quite different and in my opinion, more attractive. The most popular videos for eStream users at Lancaster University are displayed on this page for easy access.

The icons to search categories, create new media or open tools are slightly different but can still be found at the top of the page to the right of the search bar.

The Lancaster eStream homepage as shown with the users area side bar open.

Creating new media

To create or record media in eStream go to the cloud icon at the top of the page and this will open the “Create Media Options”.

From here you can access the web recorder as well as other ways to add content to eStream such as the options to create a playlist, upload media, add external links and access the TV and radio archive (eStream Connect). eStream also has a separate option where you can import Microsoft Teams Meetings from your OneDrive which is useful for captioning and sharing online lectures or events with students and other staff.

The web recorder no longer needs additional browser plugins to work and can work on any browser. For example, when using Chrome as your browser, to use the web recorder you had to enable a Planet eStream extension – this no longer applies in the updated version.

Continue reading eStream 2025 update: What’s new? →

Mentimeter: Have you got your account yet?

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The University has purchased staff licenses to Mentimeter, an interactive polling solution. This gives staff free access to all the features of Mentimeter if they sign up for an account with the University. Since its launch in October, use of the tool has been growing across the University.

Mentimeter gets students more actively involved in sessions whether they be seminars, lectures or workshops. Students can type in a code or scan a QR code and get right to the activity. It is particularly useful for engaging large groups especially when some of those students may be anxious to speak out or ask a question in front of their peers.

Mentimeter offers a range of features and activities such as:

  • Multiple choice quizzes
  • Word Cloud creation
  • Pin on an image
  • Q&A sessions
  • Quick forms
  • Open ended questions and more!

How does it work?

Once you have requested your license and completed the sign up, you will find that the Mentimeter “Home” page has a simple interface. An activity or presentation in Mentimeter is known as a Menti.

The Mentimeter "Home" page.
A screenshot of the Mentimeter home page when a user is logged in.

To start your own Menti, click the black “New Menti” button. This will take you to a new presentation. The first slide of the presentation gives you three options:

  1. Start from scratch
  2. Use a template
  3. Import slides (from a PowerPoint, Keynote or PDF)

When you click “start from scratch”, this gives you the option to choose from a range of interactive questions, quiz competitions or content slides. Once you have chosen an option, you can use the right-hand menu to begin setting up the question/activity/presentation.

You can add as many slides to the presentation as you wish and have a range of content types. As with any presentation, you can change the size and colour of the text as well as the background. You can include images too. There are options to have “themes” and to adapt the participation options to your needs. For example, you can change the settings so students can select multiple options and you can show responses live or hide responses until everyone has answered.

It certainly is a solution that is easy to use and play around with. Nevertheless, there are lots of guides and support out there too. A good place to start looking for support is the ASK page on Mentimeter.

Why move from my free license?

You may have been using Mentimeter for years now and be using a free license like that you signed up for. It is worth switching your account to a University one for several reasons:

  1. With a license, you are no longer limited to 50 participants on your Menti at one time. You can have up too 10,000 participants!
  2. You can access the moderation feature to assess the suitability of responses
  3. You get access to a wider range of activities such as the “quick form”.
  4. You can export results to Excel
  5. You can collaborate with other colleagues to create presentations together

The University of Lancaster has also done due diligence when agreeing to purchase licenses from this company and therefore, it is more secure to use this one than any other third party solution that may not have been investigated.

How can I learn more on how to use it?

On Friday 22nd November, I gave a training session to Faculty of Health and Medicine (FHM) staff on how to use Mentimeter. It was part of a series of short, lunchtime sessions on a range of topics. The recording of this session is available to view on eStream. If you need further help or support on the use of this tool, get in touch with myself if you are in FHM or raise a ticket with the IT Help Centre.

Training Offering – Winter 2024

Events, , ,

We are currently offering the following lunch-time training sessions to staff in the Faculty of Health and Medicine (FHM) but staff from across the University are very welcome to join:

Monday 25th November (12-12:30): Moodle H5P Activities: A Showcase

H5P activities are interactive and often gamified content on Moodle such as interactive videos, flashcards, image hotspots, Cornell notes, crosswords and more! In this session you can preview a selection of the activities and learn how to set one up in Moodle. Including H5P content in your Moodle spaces will help engage your students and many of the activities are great for revision.

Use this link to book your place: https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4293160

Thursday 5th December (12-12:30): A new Moodle layout: images, summaries and more!

Learn how to create a more engaging looking Moodle space by using the “one section per page” layout and adding images and summaries to each of the sections. You will also learn about student feedback on Moodle layouts and templates and what students like to see in a Moodle space.

Use this link to book your place: https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4293167

Monday 9th December (12-12:30): Making documents accessible

In this short session, we will look at how to use the accessibility features in Microsoft Word and Microsoft PowerPoint. We will also look at how to make .pdf documents accessible using Adobe Acrobat Pro. Due to the length of the session, this will be a demonstration session rather than a workshop. Follow-up appointment details will be shared in the session to book a 1:1 support meeting to put what you have learned into practice if required.

Use this link to book your place: https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4293168

Monday 16th December (12-12:30): Resource Lists in Moodle

In this short session you will look at how resource lists in Moodle work and how to edit/manage them. You will also learn about how to add shorter weekly or topic based reading/resource lists to your Moodle spaces.

Use this link to book your place: https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4293173

Meetings will take place online and attendees will receive a recording. We hope to see you all there!

Group Work: Tips, Tricks & Technology

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Group work…often dreaded by teachers and sometimes by students too! When I first started teaching in 2017, I was reluctant to use group work activities. They were tricky and time-consuming to set up and I quite often didn’t get the outcomes I was looking for. I had very little experience with educational technology as it didn’t form part of my PGCE at a time when Microsoft Teams had only just been launched and the Covid-19 pandemic hadn’t happened yet.

Since that time though, I’ve picked up some tips and tricks that have helped me to facilitate successful group projects both inside and outside the classroom. Now working in higher education, post-pandemic and in a world where technology enhanced learning is much more centre stage, I’m more comfortable with facilitating successful collaborations. Group work isn’t something I dread anymore! As a result, I thought I would share some tips and tricks as well as suggestions of activities/tools that are available at Lancaster University that could be utilised when asking students to work together.

Create Connections

Connecting with strangers is hard! Students are forced into a learning environment together and often expected to collaborate and discuss things with each other when they have only just met. This situation is a daunting one for many, even for staff! We have all been asked to “turn to the person next to you” to complete some activity…I don’t know about you, but sometimes this makes me wish I hadn’t attended the session and it can get awkward fast. Creating a comfortable and connected learning community is important to help facilitate successful group work. The community building often needs to happen in advance of the activity or project too so that students have time to form connections and get comfortable in the moment.

One tip is to encourage a digital “water cooler”; a place where students can chat freely. Many staff already encourage students to create their own groups, for example via WhatsApp. However, as staff we can also create spaces, for example a forum in Moodle that you don’t access and leave for students to communicate with each other or a Microsoft Teams space for students. There are many tools and ways to create a communication space for students, I’ve only mentioned a few but it will certainly help create those connections that will support students when they are asked to work together. OneHE has a page full of ideas for “warm up activities” to help students engage in low-stakes conversations which will help facilitate the start of those connections that will eventually support collaborative work.

Roles and Responsibilities

Getting everyone to participate in group work is a difficult task for every educator or facilitator. One recommended, tried and tested method is to establish roles and responsibilities within the group. The roles themselves can be varied and may be specific to the project or task that you set your students. For example, you might have a team leader, a note-taker, an external stakeholder manager, a proof-reader, a meeting chair…the possibilities are endless! AdvanceHE has some excellent guidance with top tips and resources on how to set up groupwork. They too suggest giving students roles and asking them to reflect on the diversity of skills in the group to ensure effective collaboration.

As an institution who uses Moodle, we have the ‘Board’ activity available to use. This activity can be set up in group mode so that each group can collaborate. One use case for group activity is to set it up as project management board with columns such as “to-do”, “in progress”, “done” and “blocked”. That way students can manage their workload together and keep track of their progress. Below is an example of a Moodle ‘Board’ activity set up in this way:

An example of a Moodle "board" activity.
An example of a ‘Board’ activity in Moodle

A similar thing can be created using Microsoft Planner within a Microsoft Teams space. For training and support in creating either of these resources, get in touch.

Continue reading Group Work: Tips, Tricks & Technology →

Making your lecture videos interactive with Panopto

Pedagogy, , ,

From the Digital Learning Team’s recent surveys and focus groups, we know that students really appreciate when lectures are recorded.

Lecture recordings are useful to support revision and to support students when reviewing difficult concepts. At Lancaster, there are a number of Panopto features that are used consistently such as captioning. It is also common for lecturers to review the viewing statistics which can help identify which parts of a lecture students are watching the most.

However, many people are unaware of the ability to add formative quizzes and also short video clips to recordings. This post, will walk you through how to do this to support student engagement and revision.

Adding a quiz

There are four types of question that can be added to a Panopto video:

  1. True/False
  2. Multiple Choice
  3. Multiple Select
  4. Fill in the Blank

To add a quiz to your chosen video, click the edit button (see below) on the banner across the top of the screen.

Edit button on Panopto

Choose the part on the video editing timeline that you would like to add a quiz to. The red verticle line is where the quiz will be added.

Video editing timeline with vertical red coloured bar.

Then you can either click the quizzes option on the left-hand menu as shown below:

Menu with the 'Quizzes' option highlighted in green.

OR

You can click the plus button above the video editing timeline which gives you a pop -up list of options as shown below:

Pop-up menu with the "add a quiz" option highlighted.

This will then give you the option to add a quiz at the point that you have chosen in the video and the quiz editing screen will appear (see below). You can add as many questions as you like and change the type of question from the drop-down menu on the right-hand side.

Quiz editing screen in Panopto

It is possible to have multiple short quizzes in one video and the video will pause to allow the students to complete the quiz. The screenshot below shows the quiz screen that students would see and the number of questions in the quiz appears in the right hand corner. Students get to review answers at the end of the quiz and can see their total score.

The interactive quiz that appears for students as they play through a Panopto video.

You can also view the quiz results of your students from the settings menu. This will give you an insight into which topics your group feel confident with and which topics they might need support with.

A great way to help your students review complex material!

Adding a YouTube video clip

This can be done by selecting plus button and then the option from the drop-down menu below the ‘Add a quiz’ option.

Pop up menu with "Add a Youtube video" highlighted

This editing screen will then appear:

YouTube video editing screen on Panopto

From here you can add the link (URL) to the YouTube video you would like to include, adjust the time when you want the video to start playing and you can also decide whether you want the whole clip to play or just part of it using the “start” and “end” options.

If you keep “Show YouTube controls” ticked by default, this will allow users to view the subtitles for the video if required due to preference or accessibility needs.

For more information on Panopto,  you can visit the ASK page.

If you need further support on making Panopto videos interactive, get in touch with a member of the Digital Learning Team.

 

 

Getting started with Gen AI

Pedagogy, , ,

Written by Andy Holgate, Library Digital Skills Developer

Generative AI really is a disruptive technology, and it’s already altering the way we produce content across society: entertainment, education, marketing, and even software engineering.
There are good and bad uses, especially in education, but it is a technology that we can embrace and use well, and more than anything else I want to stress WE DON’T HAVE TO BE SCARED OF GEN AI!

There is so much misinformation out there on the subject (and yes, ironically, most of it has probably been created by Generative AI). I don’t know about you but for me it was difficult knowing where to start. I had so many questions, I’d heard so many things, and I had no clue where to go for answers.

Well ok that’s not entirely true, unless you were living under a rock, you will have been aware that back in 2023 the University issued guidelines on the subject: Principles for the Educational Application of Generative AI in which the University states “Lancaster University promotes a culture of Generative AI (Gen AI) awareness, criticality and expertise. We encourage effective and responsible use of Gen AI technologies in learning and teaching, fostering student and staff digital and academic literacies.” This was further expanded on with guidance on various types of AI, how it could be used, the pitfalls of using it etc. That further guidance is available here: Using AI in your learning and assessment and it’s a really good starting point.

So, let me explain a little more about how I found myself stood at the foot of a sheer rock face called Gen AI. I work in professional services, the library to be exact, and part of my role is to help colleagues with increasing their digital skills. Back in 2023 I was presented with the phrase “We need to run a training session on Gen AI for the library staff. Introducing it, how it could used etc…” I’m not going to lie, I looked at my manager and behind my smile I was thinking “Where do I start?”.

So, I ran some internet searches, read a few blogs and articles and started to get an idea of what it was all about. Turns out it wasn’t as alien as I thought, I’d been using forms of it for years in google translate, MS office products, library databases, that app on my phone that let me edit photos in lots of weird and wonderful ways. Seeing that familiarity suddenly made it less scary.

The tool for me that really brought my knowledge up to speed was LinkedIn Learning. The University had bought a subscription in 2023 giving all students and staff access to over 22,000 training videos and courses. Now cards on the table, I have to admit that part of my role is the promotion of the platform at the University, so maybe I am slightly biased BUT hey I’m not on commission! I looked at LinkedIn Learning and discovered that there was a lot of material available on the subject. I started watching videos to learn more. I was pressed for time and working to a deadline so I deliberately chose videos rather than full courses, meaning I could watch a three minute video from an expert explaining just what Chat GPT was. I watched quite a few on various subjects such as Google Bard, Canva, ethics of AI, brainstorming with Gen AI, searching with Gen AI and a whole lot more. I had massively increased my awareness in a short amount of time, and all the while using a professional, reliable source. Now, you have the opportunity to do the same.

Working with others across the University, we have created a LinkedIn Learning pathway called A beginner’s guide to generative ai.
This is split into sections and the first few are comprised of the short videos I mentioned above, you don’t have to watch them all, you can dip in and out as you please. At the start there is a general introduction which formed part of the training session I ran for library staff – it’s the basics in very plain English, written how I would want to be taught. Next, you get the videos which really will introduce you to most aspects of Gen AI and where it stands as of now in early 2024.
Now don’t be put off when you see the pathway says it contains 22 hours of learning, the first 24 videos ( the short introduction ones ) come in at under 90 minutes total. The final section of the pathway is courses, so if you want to climb further up that AI rock face you can do, but understandably not everyone needs to.

I hope that all makes sense, and if you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading. So go have a look at the pathway, quell any fears you may have and embrace the technology (no harm in questioning it either). I’m old enough to remember the dawn of the modern internet (not the original military one) and people feared it, today it’s woven into every fabric of modern life. Gen AI is the next thread in that rich tapestry.

If you have any questions or comments about this blog post or the LinkedIn Learning pathway, please get in touch with me.

Disclaimer: the opinions expressed in this blog are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of the university.

Semi-Immersive Decision Theatre: What is it and how can I get involved?

Pedagogy,

Written by Oliver Fitton, Lecturer in Criminology.

In October 2022, Lancaster University announced a multi-million pound investment in new teaching facilities, supported by funding from the Office for Students. This includes a new Semi-Immersive Decision Theatre, currently under construction on A floor in Charles Carter. But what is a Semi-Immersive Decision Theatre and what opportunities does it create?

The Decision Theatre concept is not new. Arizona State University developed theirs nearly 20 years ago. Since then, other universities, training centres, and corporations have built their own. All Decision Theatres are dedicated spaces in which groups of people can collaboratively work through complex problems supported by data visualisation technology. Decision Theatres could be used as command centres during genuine crises with real life data being streamed into the room live. More often, Decision Theatres are supported by educators who develop scenarios specifically designed to train decision makers in crisis management and leadership.

An example might be useful. In response to a major incident, it is important that the emergency services can work together. Police, fire and rescue, ambulance, the armed forces, search and rescue, mountain rescue, coast guard, RNLI (the list goes on…), each have their own processes, data streams, communication channels, even jargon that other organisations cannot interface with. To deal with this the UK developed a protocol (JESIP) under which major incidents could be coordinated. To be effective in applying this protocol in a disaster situation the organisations need training and exercising. This is where a Decision Theatre comes into its own. Educators can create a complex scenario that unfolds over hours or even days. Decision makers from each emergency service can sit together in the Decision Theatre, see all the data that they would have available to them, and collaborate with their opposite numbers from other services. The participants can be monitored from an adjoining control room, allowing for two-way interaction between educators and participants. Learning from this kind of scenario improves collaboration, identifies issues within the protocol, and gives decision makers experience of life like, time sensitive decision making.

Decision Theatres can be used for much smaller scale teaching too. Any situation in which learners are given a scenario and asked to make decisions could be enriched. Having the facilitator out of the way in a control room may change group dynamics. The ability to monitor the room using video and audio feeds and supply information via digital displays opens new possibilities for engaging learners. In addition to teaching, the space could be used by researchers for monitoring group dynamics or decision making.

At Lancaster University we are taking the Decision Theatre concept a step further. We want to make the experience a little more immersive. One of the unique aspects of Decision Theatres is their ability to dynamically display data. An immersive environment such as a CAVE takes immersion to an extreme, turning walls, floors and ceilings into surface on which a dynamic environment is projected. One can be transported to a forest, the top of a mountain, the bottom of the sea or anywhere else your imagination (and graphics design budget) could come up with. The problem with a CAVE is that they are difficult to do well at high resolution and applications of low-resolution CAVEs have been shown to be limited.

Lancaster University’s Semi-Immersive Decision Theatre aims to take the best elements of these applications to create a decision space that better immerses learners/research participants.

Continue reading Semi-Immersive Decision Theatre: What is it and how can I get involved? →

Lecture Capture: Why do we have it and how is it changing?

Pedagogy, ,

The Panopto system has recently come onto the Digital Learning Team’s remit. We will be helping you manually schedule recordings (if needed!) and ensuring that scheduled recordings are taking place when and where they should. In addition, a new retention policy has come into effect this week regarding content on Panopto so I thought it was a good time for a Panopto blog update!

What is it and why do we have it?

If you are new to Lancaster University, you may not have used Panopto before or perhaps are familiar with a similar lecture capture system like Echo 360. Through the Panopto system, it is possible to record lectures and other teaching content for students to play back. It can record the lecturer and the resources like a PowerPoint or something shown on a visualiser.

Lecture capture is really useful for students as it helps them review material that they are not confident with, revise for exams and also helps them not feel left behind if they miss a lecture. Panopto is available in all lecture rooms in the following buildings: Biology, Bowland Main, Bowland North, Charles Carter, County Main, County South, Faraday, Furness, Fylde, George Fox, LICA and the Management School.  It is important to note that your permission needs to be given for automatic recordings to take place, recordings aren’t turned on by default. To opt-in, get in touch with your department coordinator. Lecture recordings are turned on via LUSI for regularly timetabled sessions. For one off sessions, lecture capture can be requested by completing the relevant form. Staff are required to check that captions are provided on all recordings and to make sure that the captions are accurate to ensure that resources are accessible to everyone. Once this has been done, the recordings can be shared with students, for example via Moodle. It is also possible to add quizzes into Panopto recordings to check student understanding and make the resources more engaging for revision purposes.

During the pandemic, the number of recorded lecturers increased dramatically (as expected!). This number has remained high with 60,881 Panopto videos added to Moodle via the Panopto activity in the last academic year. Students find lecture capture a particularly valuable learning tool as highlighted in JISC’s ‘Student Digital Experience Insights survey 2022/23’ from September 2023. The survey found that students thought lecture recording was “one of the most positive aspects of learning using digital technology”. The survey also showed just how widely used lecture capture is in higher education to the point where it is considered the norm. As a result, we hope this resource will continue to be widely used by staff to support students here at Lancaster.

How is Panopto changing?

A new Panopto retention policy came into effect this week. The retention policy has come into effect to ensure that there is room for more footage to be recorded in the coming years (things were getting full!). This means that 27587 videos, which equates to around 30054 hours of footage, were placed in the Panopto archive. Don’t panic! This does not mean that they have been deleted!

The videos that have been archived were identified as resources that are over 4 years old and have not been viewed in the past twelve months. These videos have been moved to a separate storage system, the ‘archive’ in Panopto. You can still search for these videos on Panopto and request to view them. They will then be extracted from the archive which will take around 20 minutes. If these videos are then regularly viewed, they will not return to the archive, but if there are no further views in 30 days, they will return to the archive. If you have recordings on Panopto that have been archived the ‘archived’ button will appear (see image below). If there are no videos in the archive made by you this button will not be shown. Students and staff can also request archived footage that has been embedded or added as an activity in Moodle as the link on the Moodle page will take you to Panopto to make this request for archived footage. If needed, Panopto has provided some instructions on how to restore content from the archive folder.

Archive icon on Panopto

For more information on Panopto and how to use it, look at the Panopto information available on ASK. There are also terms and conditions that come along with recording in Panopto that you should be aware of.

Training Sessions Available!

Events, ,

In addition to my last post about training sessions in September, we are now offering more sessions on Panopto Lecture Capture, Moodle quizzes and assessment.

The dates, times, topics and sign-up links for our upcoming training sessions can be found below. Some of the events can be attended online or in-person as indicated.

  1. Introduction to Moodle for Staff (hybrid), Tuesday 19th September at 2pm, https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4076794
  2. Introduction to Panopto Lecture Capture (hybrid), Thursday 21st September at 2pm, https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4076796
  3. Moodle for Course Administrators (hybrid), Thursday 28th September at 2pm, https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4076797
  4. Assignments Part 1 – Moodle Assignments (in-person), Tuesday 24th October at 2pm, https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4076798
  5. Quizzes Part 1 – Questions and Question Bank (in-person), Thursday 2nd November at 2pm, https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4076800
  6. Assignments Part 2 – Peer Moderation and Assessment (in-person), Friday 3rd November at 10am, https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4076799
  7. Quizzes Part 2 – Quizzes and Quiz Management (in-person), Monday 6th November at 10am, https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4076801
  8. Quizzes Part 3 – Quiz Grading and Reports (in-person), Thursday 9th November at 2pm, https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/event/4076802

Book a space as soon as you can to avoid disappointment. Please spread the word on these events to other departments and colleagues!

10 Things that you probably didn’t know about LinkedIn Learning

Sharing Practice, Uncategorized, , ,

Written by Andy Holgate, Library Digital Skills Developer

In this blog post I’ll be talking you through some aspects of LinkedIn Learning that you may not know, and if you did know them, you get a bonus point for each (no prize unfortunately) but before that let me explain what LinkedIn Learning is.

LinkedIn Learning provides access to over 18,000 online learning courses, taught by industry experts. It is video based, and courses range from a couple of minutes to several hours. It is available to staff and students at Lancaster Bailrigg, Ghana and Leipzig campuses.  LinkedIn courses support skills and personal development across a broad range of topics, particularly in the areas of technology, business, and creative skills.

You can access the ASK LinkedIn Learning Guidance or go directly to the Lancaster LinkedIn Learning Sign in page.

  1. You do NOT need a LinkedIn Account to access LinkedIn Learning.

Just because they share the same name, does not mean they are the same platform. Ask yourself does a Red Panda look the same as Giant Panda? They are however both called Pandas. LinkedIn is the social media platform; LinkedIn Learning is a learning platform – they both do very different things and provide different services.
You can of course connect your LinkedIn social media profile with your learning profile if you wish or you can take courses without posting to the world about it.

  1. There is a quality control process for content.

One of the questions I’ve faced when I’ve been speaking to staff about LinkedIn Learning is “How do we know the quality is good before we take or recommend a course?”, and it’s a very valid one. First of all those who are teaching courses have to apply, they then go through an interview process and if successful are assigned a producer and script editor (remember it’s video learning).
They are then flown to the company studios in Geneva or Chicago and recorded, they receive payment and royalties based on how many people watch their courses so it is in their own interest to make it engaging.

Have a look at some courses, check out the teachers background, ultimately you have the choice (like you do with reading an academic textbook) of deciding if it meets your high standards.

  1. You can learn a wealth of new skills.

Now you probably guessed that you could visit LinkedIn Learning for your professional development and learn how to create pivot tables in Excel, create amazing presentations, or start coding with Python but did you know that you can also learn how to play acoustic guitar , use your phone to take creative photos of your pets,  learn how to paint or learn to speak Spanish and much more.

  1. Keeping up to date with the latest trends.

Let’s face it, in the summer of 2023 there is probably nothing more terrifying than being in a work team meeting and hearing “Right what are we doing about AI?”. If you are anything like me (and old like me) your palms will start to sweat as you nervously look at your feet and instantly think of a Terminator movie.
LinkedIn Learning updates and adds over 50 courses each week and it has loads of easy to understand and digest content on AI. Have a look at the course AI Trends which was updated on the 24th August and stop looking nervously at your feet.

  1. Supplementing curricular teaching.

You can enhance your students experience by letting LinkedIn Learning work for you.
LinkedIn Learning is a great all-in-one solution for enhancing all types of education. From soft skills to software, there’s a course to add (not replace) value to any academic program.
It can be used to teach technical and presentation skills outside of the classroom, flipping the classroom and supporting hybrid learning. Maybe think about using it with pre-arrival students? Courses and videos can be linked to from Moodle.

  1. Save the department some money?

If you are a line manager, it may come up in a staff member’s PDR that they would like some development, rather than send them on an external course, why not first have a look to see what is available in LinkedIn Learning – the department would save on course fees, travel etc.

  1. Enhance your career prospects.

So I had better whisper this one, if you want to take a step up the ladder or indeed go in a completely different direction have a look at LinkedIn Learning. There are courses on writing your CV, writing a cover letter and mastering common interview questions.

If you decide that you have had enough of being a librarian and you want to be a Social Media Manager then you can follow the Role guide which will give you a variety of courses to start you on your journey and suggest learning groups that you can join on LinkedIn, so that you can interact with peers in that industry. So what are you waiting for, enhance your skills and develop your career BUT please stay, we like you. Continue reading 10 Things that you probably didn’t know about LinkedIn Learning →